No Accident
by Quickbeam10
Summary: A missing scene towards the conclusion of the episode "The Deadly Ones"


No Accident

_"God keep our country." _These were Diaz's last words before succumbing to his wounds. His parting thoughts were not of himself, but for the country he had loved and its people.

With a heavy heart, Ben quietly folded the dead general's arms upon his chest before turning with utter disgust towards the man who was sprawled out upon the Ponderosa's dining room floor no more than a foot away from him. Forsythe was dead from Ben's own hand. The difference between this deserter's death and the general's was that Forsythe cared for no one but himself. Unlike Diaz, he knew nothing of honor or duty. During the brief period Forsythe and his other greedy conspirators had laid deadly siege to his ranch, Ben knew this unprincipled human being was a mercenary, willing to do whatever it would take to get what he wanted. General Diaz's initial words towards Forsythe best summed up his character- _pistolero _- a hired killer and bandit. The man was a blight upon society.

Few men had caused Ben to feel so much rancor. Only Sam Wolfe's name, for the present moment, held the same sway over him, perhaps because both men had hurt Joseph without provocation. Though he had kept his silence for his own reasons, there was no need for General Diaz to disclose to Ben which of his men carried the sawed off shotgun used to harm his son. Forsythe's words had said it all in the moments following Ben's initial discovery of his bleeding child upon the settee.

"_Looks like he had a little accident, Mr. Cartwright." _

Even now with Forsythe dead, these callous words had the power to assault his senses to the point that if this assassin had not already perished, Ben would have gladly helped him on his way by choking the life out of him.

'Accident?' How could someone make light of something so sinister than to hurt an innocent boy? It was no accident that his son now lay upstairs struggling to recover from a bullet wound to the back, and Joe was not his only victim. The General, too, had been ambushed by his own hired gun and now lay deceased from a second confrontation with the man.

Looking at the shambles of his home about him, Ben Cartwright shook his head in revulsion and distress. A few feet away, Molly attempted to help an injured Sims to his feet. Both of them stunned by the impact of the violence that had happened around them. During the duration of the Mexicans' invasion upon the Ponderosa, Johnny had been on the fence as to which faction he would throw in with; remain faithful to General Diaz and the army of Benito Juarez or let greed take the upper hand and side with Forsythe. In the end, it was Molly's influence and perhaps Ben's words, which had helped the young man to stay upon the right course, but in the milieu of the ensuing gun battle which followed, Sims had been winged in the shoulder by Pablo. Ben, who with no plan but to get aid for his son, had escaped through the bedroom window and out onto the roof. While the General confronted Forsythe downstairs, Ben ambushed Pablo through the front door disarming him of his gun before knocking him out cold. Then, seconds later, after Forsythe had shot Diaz at close range, Ben turned the gun, he had confiscated from the Mexican, upon the villain and turned victor into victim.

The impact of the upheaval upon all ,who had survived this night, was staggering. Ben took a few moments to clear his head, while Molly ran to grab something with which to staunch Johnny's bleeding. With gun still in hand, Ben looked from Pablo to Sims, still not completely sure of whom he could trust. His gut instinct told him to run and see to Joseph, but he could not risk allowing any further trouble to erupt in his absence.

Noting his hesitation, Johnny spoke up. "It's alright, Mr. Cartwright. I don't mean to cause any more trouble." And in an act of good faith, the young man removed his bloodied, right hand momentarily from his injured shoulder and withdrew his gun slowly from his holster before sliding it across the room towards the silver-haired man. Gathering up the discarded weapon along with Forsythe's firearm, Ben quickly moved to lock them both away. During the span of time it took him to do so, Molly returned with some of Hop Sing's dish cloths from the kitchen and began tending to Johnny's wound.

Moving closer to the pair, Ben grabbed hold of one of the extras towels, and with his strong hands ripped it nearly in two before twisting it tightly to bolster its strength . Then dragging a still unconscious Pablo towards the staircase, he pulled the incognizant man's hands behind him and tied them with the cloth to the newel post. With the Mexican temporarily secured, and Sims without a weapon as well as his gun arm incapacitated, Ben felt sure enough to leave the scene and finally check on Joseph. He knew it was not the best laid plan, but it would have to do for now. He needed to see his son.

Taking the stairs two at at time, Ben rushed up towards his son's room, and to his dismay upon entering it, he found Joseph slumped beside his bed. It looked as if the boy had tried to get up and in the process had fallen over. Weakly, to no effect, Joe's hands were grasping desperately at the tangle of bed clothes by the foot of his bed in an awkward attempt to find some anchor with which to pull himself upright. Groans of frustration joined gasps of pain as the boy struggled futilely to gain his feet while repeatedly stating over and over, "Pa... I've got to help my pa..."

In seconds, Ben was beside him, gathering up his youngest into the comfort of his arms while reassuring him that all would be alright. "Joe, it's me. Pa. I've got you son. You can relax. Everything is going to be alright now."

Turning fever-bright eyes towards the sound of his father's voice, Joe reached blindly towards him as he replied in disbelief "Pa, is it really you? They didn't hurt you, did they? I heard gunshots. I thought you were dead..." His youngest exclaimed in a rush of words before his voice cracked with emotion.

"No, son. They didn't hurt me," Ben answered while drawing the boy even closer to him upon the floor. He could feel the heat of fever still emanating from Joe's flesh. "No, I'm unharmed," He soothed again as he felt the boy's lingering tension. "Everything will be alright," He repeated with a tight voice while trying to reassure his son as well as himself.

Even as Ben continued in his attempts to comfort the boy, a shudder passed through him as his mind went over all they had been through during the last harrowing 48 hours. The tremor of emotion, however, went undetected by his son as Joe finally gave into the overwhelming fatigue from his injuries.

Placing a kiss against the crown of his son's head, Ben at last came to grips with all that he had stood to lose if Forsythe had gotten his way. Diaz might have been fighting for his country and his compatriots, but Ben had been fighting for his life's blood- his family.

The image of his son, torn open and bleeding upon the settee, would stay with him forever. No matter how altruistic Diaz's goal had been in carrying out his mission, he had put Ben's family at risk in the process, and Ben, in turn, had almost lost one of his sons as a result. That was too high of a price to ask of him. Turning to lift his now drowsy son back up upon his bed, Ben's dark eyes, bright from unshed tears, realized that it had been no accident that both he and Joseph had come through this ordeal. For nothing under heaven or on earth would keep him from protecting one of his children. Nothing, but his own death.

_* The italicized dialogue was taken directly from the episode, "The Deadly Ones."_


End file.
